A bushing with optimized structure for improved resistance in applications with repeated impact fatigue or stress / strain conditions.

The POLYLUBE^® IFR bushing offers the same inherent anti-friction components that allow it to achieve the low wear characteristics of the Fiber and MRP series bushings. However, in comparison to these two products, the IFR bushing (Improved Fatigue Resistance) offers a proprietary laminate structure of the bushing backing that increases the bushing's resistance to repeated stress/strain conditions.

A traditional filament wound composite bushing application that kept resulting in failure after just 10,000 oscillatory cycles drove Polygon to develop the IFR bushing. The pressure on the bushing was well under the design threshold with the actual applied pressure to the bushing was 10,000 PSI. In response to this customer's demand, Polygon Company developed an improved fatigue bushing that in the case of the above application increased the life of the bushing by over 50%.

Because composite filament wound bushings are not isotropic materials as are metals, Polygon Company's FEA laminate analysis focused on what was believed to be the limiting factor: optimization of system's interlaminar shear. POLYLUBE^® IFR bushings offers a more than twofold increase in the impact fatigue over traditional composite bushing materials.

Product Schematic

Traditional filament wound composite bushings will tend to show fatigue failure in the form of resin shear failure in the traverse direction to the reinforcing fibers. The logical solution to this problem was to try to cross-tie the reinforcing fibers together with other reinforcing fibers so as to minimize the shear stresses in the resin.